gm.
paramount and warner bros become skydance. tesla's Q3 beat estimates. and here's what's happening at nike.
3 things worth your time
1. paramount and warner bros officially merge tomorrow.
on thursday, david ellison announced that the $110 billion merger between paramount and warner bros. discovery will close tomorrow. the combined company will be named skydance (after ellison's production company). ellison runs the new company as chairman and CEO. ynon kreiz, who most recently ran mattel, joins today as co-CEO overseeing day-to-day operations.
for context: paramount owns CBS, MTV, nickelodeon, paramount pictures, and paramount+. warner bros. discovery owns HBO, CNN, warner bros. pictures, DC films, and HBO max. combining them puts all of that under one roof.
this is the biggest hollywood M&A deal in decades. the industry has been consolidating for years, but putting paramount and warner bros under one owner is a shock. the open question now is what disney, universal, and sony do next in a market where their biggest competitor just got twice as big.
2. tesla's Q3 beat expectations. second-biggest quarter in company history.
on thursday, tesla reported Q3 2026 deliveries of 486,532 vehicles, beating analyst consensus by roughly 25,000 cars. Model 3 and Model Y did most of it (478,237 units). stock jumped 5% on friday.
what's driving the beat: a mix of recent model refreshes and better pricing. after two straight years of annual delivery declines (2024 and 2025), this is the clearest sign tesla's product and pricing moves are landing.
what's next: the roadster reveal is still coming. musk has publicly hinted at merging tesla with spacex in the next year or two. and optimus (humanoid robot) and cybercab (robotaxi) are both deep in testing.
3. what's actually happening at nike.
nike stock is down roughly 81% from its peak. its market cap has fallen from about $264 billion to about $50 billion. on september 21, nike was removed from the S&P 100 index after 18 years (it stays in the S&P 500 and the dow). and this week nike said it will stop reporting greater china sales starting next fiscal year.
three things are driving it:
china. nike's china revenue fell 30%+ to $5.8 billion in fiscal 2026. chinese rivals anta and li ning have taken market share for 8 straight quarters. local brands tapping into chinese pride in domestic sportswear have won over younger chinese consumers.
direct-to-consumer backfired. nike spent years cutting out wholesale partners (foot locker, dicks sporting goods, etc) to sell directly to customers at higher margins. the DTC push left inventory stuck with retailers and left nike exposed when demand softened.
running got crowded. on, hoka, new balance, and asics have all taken running share. nike was slow to respond. losing mbappé to on last month was a symbolic blow in soccer, too.
pulling the china number from reports is the real tell. companies don't stop disclosing metrics that are improving. textbook example of how a dominant brand loses its moat.
two more quick things
AMD acquired fei-fei li's World Labs for $8.2 billion.
AMD just bought World Labs, the physical-AI startup founded by stanford professor fei-fei li. World Labs builds "large world models" that aim to help AI understand 3D space the way humans do (think robots, self-driving cars). fei-fei is one of the most respected AI researchers alive (she co-created ImageNet, the dataset that basically kicked off modern deep learning). she joins AMD as chief scientist reporting to CEO lisa su. this is AMD's second-biggest acquisition ever, behind the $50 billion xilinx deal in 2022.
pop-tarts ended its booze collab after one month.
in august, mars-owned pop-tarts launched a collab with buzzballz, the ready-to-drink cocktail brand. two flavors: frosted s'mores and frosted brown sugar cinnamon, both at 15% ABV, in cans with pop-tarts' blue branding and pictures of the pastries. 30+ public health groups immediately pressured mars over concerns a kids-cereal brand co-branding alcohol would appeal to minors. mars pulled it last week and said pop-tarts won't do alcohol partnerships again
see you thursday.
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